When he arrived in this great and rich commercial city with its
splendid houses, swaying ships and busy people, his eye was at once
caught by a large and handsome house, of a magnificence for which nothing
in all his wanderings from Tuttlingen to Amsterdam could possibly have prepared
him. For a good long time he gazed at this luxurious building in
astonishment, its six chimneys, its beautiful cornices and its tall
windows, any one of them larger than the door of his father's house at
home. Finally he could contain his curiosity no longer. ``My good
friend,'' he said to a passer-by, ``Could you please tell me the name
of the gentleman who owns this wonderfully beautiful house with its
windows full of tulips, daisies and stocks?? But the man, who had more
pressing matters to attend to, and who (sadly) understood no more
German than his questioner understood Dutch — which is to say none at
all — merely said brusquely, ``Kannitverstan'' and vanished. ``He
must have been an awfully rich man, this Herr Kannitverstan....''
mused our hero .... and went on his way.
His wanderings eventually took him to the bay they call there Het Ey
(``the Y''), where there were more ships all together in one place and at
one time than he ever seen anywhere anytime in all his life so far.
At first he didn't know how he could take in all these marvels with
his two eyes alone, but finally his attention was caught by a large
ship which had recently arrived from the East Indies and was just then
being unloaded. Whole rows of boxes and bales were already standing on
and beside one another on land, and there were more being rolled out
all the time, and barrels full of sugar, of coffee, of rice and pepper
(and mouse droppings too). And when he had gazed on all this for a
good long time, he asked a man who was carrying one of the chests on
his shoulder for the name of the lucky man for whom the sea was
bringing all these goods to shore. ``Kannitverstan'' was the reply. At
this he thought, ``Aha, so that's it, is it! Of course, that's how he
can afford such a wonderful and amazing house.''
Unfortunately this discovery prompted him to a very sad train of
thought: what a poor man he was among so many rich people in the
world, and so on. But — just as he was thinking if only I had it
as good as this Herr Kannitverstan, I ... — he turned a corner
and saw a long funeral procession. Four horses, draped in black, were
drawing a hearse, draped likewise in black, slowly and mournfully —
almost as if they knew that they were taking a dead man to his rest. A
long train of friends and acquaintances of the deceased followed
silently, in pairs, swathed in black coats. In the distance a lonely
bell was tolling. Naturally our hero was very struck by this sobering
spectacle and he stood there devoutly with his hat in his hands until
they had all passed by. Then he went up to the last man in the
procession (who was at that point calculating silently how much he
would profit from his cotton if it went up ten guldens a
hundredweight) gently took hold of his cloak and innocently begged his
pardon. ``That must have been a good friend of yours,'' he said, ``for
whom the bell is tolling, that you should follow the procession so
sadly and pensively. Can you tell me who it was?''
``Kannitverstan!?'' came the reply. At this news two big tears fell
from the eyes of our man from Tuttlingen. ``Poor Kannitverstan,'' he
exclaimed to himself, ``what profit do you get from all your wealth
now? Precisely what I will one day get from my poverty: a shroud and a
sheet! And from all your beautiful flowers? Perhaps a sprig of
rosemary on your cold chest....? With these thoughts in mind he
accompanied the corpse to the graveside as if he were one of the
party, saw the supposed Herr Kannitverstan lowered to his rest and
listened — much moved — to the Dutch funeral oration (of which he
understood not a word) with much closer attention than he had ever paid
to a sermon before.
Finally his spirits lifted and he went away with a light heart, found an inn where fortunately they understood German, got his appetite back and ate a nice piece of Limburger cheese. And -—ever thereafter — whenever he was again threatened by the sad reflection that so many people in the world were so rich when he was so poor, he merely had to think of Herr Kannitverstan in Amsterdam, of his great house, his rich ships and of his narrow grave.